We stayed at Port Orleans Riverside the first two nights. Since we went early, these two nights weren't covered by Sara's conference. The grounds and buildings were gorgeous, but housekeeping left something to be desired. Also, we were on the second floor of one of the buildings and there were no elevators. We were two women that had packed for a week (read as, the suitcases weighed a ton!). We decided that lugging those suitcases and walking around parks for two days justified us to not do additional workout exercises for two days. I think you'll agree.
Bright and early Saturday we hopped the bus to the Magic Kingdom. To our surprise, they had already decorated for Christmas and were playing Christmas music! Here's Sara on Main Street with Cinderella's Castle in the background.
This was my third time at Disney World. I had always really wanted to see the wax figures of the presidents at The Hall of Presidents. It's more of an adult thing to do, so we hadn't done in the previous two times because we had been with smaller kids. Here was my chance! The even had President Obama on stage and he even spoke! Here's me standing outside the entrance. By the way, this was an excellent time to visit the park because the lines were very tolerable. We just walked right in for this and wandered around looking at the presidential paraphernalia leisurely until the show started. We also had our pick of whatever seat we wanted.
On Sunday we went to Epcot. They had a wine and culinary festival going on. Neither Sara or I are big into wine, but the food was something we definitly wanted to try - and we did!
And here's the typical Epcot shot.
The only ride we went on at Epcot was "Mission: Space". In Valley Girl talk, it was totally awesome! Very realistic. After that we headed over to World Showcase. I had heard from a friend of mine, Sheila, that they now have something for kids involving Kimpossible. It was a cell phone that was like a secret agent treasure hunt. There are apparently seven different missions you can go on to seven different countries. We got one for China. We would both give it a thumbs up! Kids would have a blast figuring out the clues, plus learn something without even knowing it - what could be better?
One of the countries along the way was Moraco. The layout of they shops was what I envision shopping in Moraco. The tile work was beautiful.
That night we had to switch hotels. The Walt Disney Swan and Dolphin Resort is gorgeous. I can't complain about anything. They even replaced the three bars of soap each day that I had taken for the soap squirrel (Alyssa). The weather was a little cool to be in the pool for my taste, but all the pools were beautiful.
A funny note is something that happened at one of the shops at Epcot. We were trying to remember the names of all the princesses. We got to the one that wears the pink dress and Sara said it was Sleeping Beauty. I said I thought it was Princess Aurora. Little did we know we were both right until someone cleared it up for us - how funny! We also had the opportunity to go to Downtown Disney one evening. Outside the Bibbity Bobbity Boo Store, they had a statue of Cinderella, Sara's long time favorite, and Sleeping Beauty. How perfect!
One of the days Sara was at the conference, I went to Hollywood Studios by myself. I scoped it out to see if her boys would enjoy going to it in March, too. The parade at 3:00 featured Monsters, Inc. Very fun. Below is the character called Boo. Even though the movie was animation, Disney does a great job making the characters 3-D.
At the end of my day there I went to see the musical Beauty and the Beast.
Spending time with my sister was great. We had such a good time just being free to be as goofy as we wanted. Thanks for such a wonderful time, Sara!
